At the heart of man’s dreaming and imagination lie metaphors, myths, symbols and an empire of signs which illuminate understanding – they have the power to connote and are the building blocks by which to reflect and make sense of the world.

These are the source of Siebols’ paintings – translating those metaphors which lend themselves to abstract pictorial interpretation acting as vehicles for understanding one thing in terms of another.

Siebols’ work of the last two years has dealt with the theme of Plato’s Cave where the subject of the paintings is the shadow of forms passing on a cave wall. The cave is Plato’s allegory of human existence and the shadowy forms are the veiled essence of things. The studio is a cave where images come and go – creation, destruction and evolution.

Other recurring themes in her work are Tabula Rasa, Palimpsest, Lacuna, Illatum, Arcana and Soliloquy and these are both subject and the process of painting.

The Chinese talk of ‘writing a painting’ and Siebols’ use of the written mark stems from her study of Chinese and Japanese calligraphy. Their appreciation of the abstract nature of the written mark has prompted her to use diverse scripts as a vehicle for expression. Drawing on an encyclopaedia of scripts Siebols inscribes texts until marks are accumulated in transparent layers. Her interest is in the dialogue of these layers where words hover on the brink of legibility with the disintegration and metamorphosis of text building up word fossils and an archaeology of signs.

Jeannette Siebols lives and works in Sydney.